The Mudblood Monster
by Monkey Typewriter
Summary: Colin Napier, a Fourth Year Gryffindor, absolutely hates being around people. It's not that he hates THEM, per se... well, not most of them. But it's more about his inability to deal with them. But, very soon, Napier will find far greater problems that he must face than simply an inability to communicate with others... OC Story, during Book 5. Does not follow Harry. MOSTLY in-canon
1. I See Your Hawk, and Raise You Two

"So far, so good," I mutter to myself, glancing around the platform at the many wizarding families and children, some dressed in robes, others in regular muggle clothes, and more still in what _would_ be considered muggle attire, if it weren't for the fact that many witches and wizards have no idea how muggles dress. I saw one woman wearing a dress that seemed like it belonged in the 1800s, and a man wearing what looked to be a woman's high heels, along with a heavy winter coat, formal pants, a bow tie, and boxers, who was totally oblivious to the strange looks muggleborns, such as myself, were giving him.

I shake my head and mutter to the royal blue sparrow-hawk on my shoulder, "What a bunch of weirdoes." Patchy bobs his head in agreement, or something close to it, before spreading his wings wide, and shrieking at a nearby screech owl in a cage, trying to start a fight before I even get on the train.

"I should have left you in Jersey," I mutter to myself, walking away from the largest clusters of people, once again waiting by myself, my enormous trunk weighing me down as I make my way to wait by the back-most door onto the train.

I set the suit-case down with a sigh of relief, and lean against a support column fairly close to the near-deserted door by the caboose. A group of kids who I vaguely recognize as fellow fourth years settle by the same door I plan on using. I try to place them, but give up after a few minutes. I'm absolutely horrible with names and faces, one of many things that manages to keep me from 'being social,' as mom says.

I start feeling nauseous again, and grab at my stomach, grimacing. _Why does this keep getting worse?_ I ask myself. Not two hours ago, I nearly lost my lunch (breakfast) to one of the random waves of nausea I've had since I was little. A moment later, the strange feeling subsides, being replaced, as always, by a dull, thudding headache.

"Nausea, and headaches, and morning sickness, oh my. Sucks to be me, sometimes," I sigh, popping an Advil, the last one for a whole year, seeing as muggle medication is contraband. I wait for the doors on the train to open as I jam my hands in my jean pockets. Patchy screeches once at a nearby hawk, which spirals down to land nearby, in front of the door. I look closely at it, and realize that the solid black Coopers hawk is far too large to actually be one.

I call up my near-encyclopedic knowledge of animals, both magical and non, and think to myself, _Now, a male Coopers hawk is only supposed to be about eighteen inches long. This one is… About forty? Way too big to be natural. Probably an Engorgement Charm on it or something._ I nod sagely. _I'm an everyday Sherlock Holmes. _I shake my head. _Oh man,_ I think to myself, horrified,_ I spend too much time out of the US. My _references_ are turning British!_

I chuckle, dismissing the minor complaint, and the abnormal hawk, a moment later, but Patchy continues to glare at it angrily, like it had personally wronged him. The former Black Sparrow hawk on my shoulder (And I say former, as Patchy's currently slowly changing from blue, to purple, to red) is only about a pound and a half in weight, and twenty inches long, from the tip of his tail to the angry point of his beak, making him larger than any _common_ Coopers hawk, and fairly large for a bird, but still smallish, compared to the large hawk. But when he wants to get my attention, he gets it easily, with his incredibly loud shrieks. And it's even louder when he's perched on my shoulder, right next to my ear.

"GOD!" I shout, glaring at the bird, and ignoring the annoyed glances being thrown my way by nearby students and parents. "You heard the part where I have a headache, didn't you?" The damn bird ignores me, ruffling his feathers as another hawk, similarly larger than normal, yet even bigger, (_most likely a female hawk,_ I think to myself,) settles down beside the first.

I eye the two anomalies. _Once is a fluke. Twice is a coincidence. If there's one more over-sized animal on this platform, I swear, I'll-_

Patchy screeches _AGAIN_, and this time I manage not to shout something, simply wincing, grabbing my ear, and lifting my other hand, covered in one of my black, worn dragon-skin work/falconry gloves, and he gets the message, hopping onto my arm and staying there, as I turn to look at what _else_ is freaking Patchy out.

_For the love of-_ I smack myself on the forehead with my other gloved hand, groaning at the enormous (about the size of a small bear,) black, shaggy dog, accompanying three kids older than me, one with wild black hair and glasses, another with flaming red hair, and a girl with bushy brown hair. Behind them lurked quite a few older, very serious-looking men and women, who were scanning the crowd, as if expecting a threat to burst out from among the schoolchildren around them at any time.

_Which is legitimate enough,_ I remind myself. _Everyone here can do amazing things, provided they have their wand._ I turn back to look at the door, and see the slightly smaller, male hawk gone. In its place, stood the tall, shaggy white-haired Jordan Cross, seeming utterly bored and indifferent. He's wearing a silver chain, with an equally silver snake pendant hanging at his neck.

Somehow, I hate him even more, seeing the guy for the first time in muggle clothes. Everyone knows he's at least half-blood, and with _his_ superiority complex, the guy's most likely a pure-blood, even if he claims not to know who his dad is. The dark blue jeans and black tee do nothing to hide the ego that I know all too well. It's the same ego that pushes him to constantly beat my grades in Transfiguration, the only core course I really excel in.

I pull out my familiar eleven inch oaken wand, dangerously stowed in my pocket, twirling it like a drumstick in my right hand, after shifting Patchy to my left, in a practiced motion. I'm not exactly great at Defense Against the Dark Arts. Truth be told, I'm pretty sloppy. But my spell-power is pretty good, and sometimes, I get into the zone, slinging crazy-hard spells at insane speeds. If it came down to a fight, (_It probably won't_, I assure myself) I'd almost definitely lose, but I would try to at least get a good hex or two in.

I almost don't notice as the female hawk beside him shoots upwards, becoming a far less nonchalant girl, after a moment's transformation. Her, I don't recognize quite as easily. Rose Something-or-other. She has shoulder-length black hair, in stark contrast to Jordan's white, and her ice-blue eyes seem like the kind to pierce your soul.

I wouldn't know for sure, though; they're always aimed at Jordan. She's beautiful, in an unattainable sort of way. Slim and curvy, and only a little bit on the short side, she immediately grabs Jordan's arm with an energy that seems to surprise him. At least, his face seems surprised, for once cold, collected veneer pierced by genuine shock.

I shake my head, looking at the big, black dog, who is watching as the three kids older than me board the train. _Wait, the doors are open?_ I glance back at the doors, and sure enough, Cross and his girlfriend are gone, as is the small group of the other fourth years, the door wide open, so I set Patchy back on my shoulder, stuff my wand into my bag in its special, anti-breaking case, and begin lugging my trunk towards the train.

* * *

><p>By some miracle or other, I manage to get a compartment all to myself, and by an even greater miracle, I get the enormous suitcase into the overhead luggage compartment. Patchy flutters to sit atop one of the cushioned seats, staring out the window excitedly, waiting for some sort of movement. He loves being out and about, and he likes car and train rides almost as much as flying. Probably something about seeing the ground rush by.<p>

I shake my head. "If I could turn into a bird, like that piece of…" _Calm down. One, two, three, four, five…_ I breath out a breath I'd been holding, having calmed and collected myself. "If I could transform into a bird, like a certain person, whose name will _not_ be named, I'd be able to fly with you, Patchy." The damn bird glances me, and resumes ignoring me, excitedly watching the world outside of the scarlet train, waiting for it to start passing by us.

"Yeah, hate you too," I mutter sullenly, shaking my head. I really can't blame him, I guess. I need to keep him cooped up over the summer, just about the _whole_ Summer, only letting him fly at night. Which, of course, isn't much better than flying blind for a daytime predator like him. And as much as I want to let him out sometimes, a bird whose feathers change colors every other minute doesn't exactly go unnoticed, and I don't really want to get on the wrong side of the law, muggle or wizarding.

I glance around the empty compartment, satisfied, before realizing that I hadn't locked the door. I glance at the handle, but don't see a locking mechanism. I slap myself on the forehead. _Duh. Magic. You're on a magic train, to magic school, with a somewhat magical bird in the room, and a magical wand in your school trunk. You don't think that, maybe, magic is the solution?_

After much cursing, grunting, and sweating, I manage to take my big trunk down, fish the hard wand case out, (to keep my wand safe from breaking during travel,) and replace the bag up in the luggage area. I sit down in my seat, and pull out my wand from its special case, (which looks like an oversized, thin glasses case) designed to keep it from breaking at all costs.

Even through the thick black dragon-skin gloves, modified for hawking, I can feel the warmth coming from the wand. Whenever I'm not holding it, I feel… almost out of control. Like any moment something could go wrong, and it would be entirely my fault. But with the wand in my hand, the familiar eleven inches of dark oak, I always feel like nothing can go wrong, and like I'm in complete control.

Despite the many, many times my wand has acted practically of its own accord, firing off a spell that doesn't make sense, or doesn't match my incantation. It makes Charms class interesting, to say the least, as it _REALLY_ doesn't seem to 'like' performing them, if I'm not personifying it too much, and likes to replace the Charms with transfigurations, or sometimes hexes and jinxes.

I tap the wand against my knee, trying to think of the spell that locks things up. Immediately, my right leg, below the knee, is frozen, as if in a Full-Body Bind curse, but somehow localized to that area. I'd never even _heard_ of a spell that could freeze part of the body, leaving the rest.

_I don't want to lock up my leg!_ I tap it again hurriedly, desperately begging my wand to reverse the spell, as the numb, pins and needles feeling in my leg was making me a little crazy. After several soft taps, and one final, frustrated, angry one, my leg is free once more, and I walk up to the door, enduring the annoying tingling in my leg, tapping it, and muttering, "_Alohomora._" Absolutely nothing happens, and a moment later, I remember that that's the incantation for the _un_-locking charm.

"_Colloportus,_" I say, a little bit of embarrassment creeping into my voice, even as the strong _click_ rings out in the small room. I shake my head, and settle into one of the seats, setting my wand in my lap, and leaning my head back and trying to take a nap. After all, it's a long train ride, and what good is peace and quiet if you aren't sleeping?

And then, seconds before Mr. Sandman pays me a visit, someone starts pounding on the door, and trying to wrench it open. I decide to ignore it, but after ten seconds of _trying_ to ignore it, I give up, opening my eyes, and trying to glare daggers at someone through the door. I'm almost tempted to open the door to give them my patented Anti-Personnel Glare, but that would invite a conversation. And interaction. At least, more so than sitting in a locked room would.

_Gross_, I shudder, and rather than endure the nightmare that is trying not to seem like an awkward idiot, I just shout, "Go away!" The knocking continues, ignoring me. "Quit it!" I yell, anger creeping into my voice. And still, the incessant pounding continues, accompanied by intermittent attempts at sliding the door open. "I swear to God, I'll hex you through the door!"

"Open up!" Comes the shout of a girl, who sounds especially naggy. At the sound of her voice, I remember that almost _everyone_ in the school is British. As soon as I remember this, I try not to agonize over the 'fun' of being the only American in school, and focus on the here and now.

"No!" I say, almost incredulously. "What's so confusing about 'Go Away!?'"

"I'm a Prefect!" She nags back.

"Yeah, well I'm from New Jersey. That means NOTHING to me!" I grab my wand from my lap, and accidentally fire off a stunning spell, that whizzes past Patchy, and breaks a lamp on the wall. "Crap," I mouth, before walking over to it, whispering "_Reparo,_" the lamp easily fixing itself. I manage to come up with a way to make the noise from the stunning spell and broken lamp not seem _too_ idiotic.

"That… uh, That was a warning shot!" I shout. "Now go away!"

"Fine!" She shouts, and I relax. "_Alohomora!_" The door slides open, and I curse, sitting upright angrily as Patchy shrieks again. _My headache's coming back too. Wonderful. Social interaction just wouldn't be complete without it._

"What the Hell?" I demand of the bushy brown haired girl. "That was locked for a reason! What if I'd been changing or something!?" The girl blushes, weakly stammering something, and I just rub my temples, trying to dispel the slightly thudding pain at the front of my skull. "GO." I growl, cutting off her murmurs.

She straightens up, her face still red. She shakes her head. "These students need a place to sit, and most of the other compartments are filled up." I frown.

"You said 'most.' Then find one of the other compartments with someone friendlier." She frowns right back at me after I say this.

"I am a prefect," she repeats, "and if you don't do what I say, I'll punish you." I shake my head.

"You mean, once we get to Hogwarts, you'll petition McGonagall for the temporary authority to punish me for a particular type of infraction, and she _might_ give you limited power, after hearing my side of the story, which will then be useless to you, because I'll have already gotten my way."

I rub my face with my right hand, stuffing my wand into its case, and holding it tight with my left. I rub especially hard around my eyebrows, as rubbing my temples did nothing to help with my headache. "There's a reason Prefects don't just dole out punishments," I yawn. "Maybe if you had just asked nicely."

Her face is getting red again, but this time it's from anger. "I… That is… The most…!" I shake my head, ignoring her and peeking around her to the students. They all look like they're in my year, and are wearing the green snake on their robes. (Which, for some reason, they've already changed into.)

One girl is tall, taller than me by an inch or two, and thin, with a pretty, angular face, and long wavy black hair, dropping down to her waist behind her. She's playing with a bit of her hair, unconsciously, and glancing around the train outside of my compartment.

Another girl sees me looking at them, and gives me a small wave. I try to smile in return, but me and people… blegh. I can only imagine how self-conscious and awkward I look. She's a little on the short side, very thin and slight, pale. She too has black hair, but hers is straight, set in a ponytail with a silver clip, and it dips down to about her shoulders. Her eyes are deep blue, and she's wearing a pair of rectangular, silver rimmed glasses.

Behind them, a boy is leaning against the door to another compartment. He looks down in a funk of some sort, and is glaring at his feet, like they'd eaten his last cupcake. He's about my height, 5'8"-ish, and if the other two were pale, he's a freakin' ghost. And I've _met _ghosts. In fact, I'm better aquainted with the ghosts at school than I am with most of the people.

There's a glint of anger in his eyes that is a bit intimidating. He has a mop of raven black hair, so untidy it puts my own brown mop to shame. I'm almost certain he saw me look at him, but he doesn't do much more than take his hands out of his robe pockets and cross them.

They're all standing somewhat awkwardly, and I recognize it as how I usually stand. Unsure of where to go, of where they'll be allowed by others to go. Not really sure of who to hang out with, and who'll be okay with hanging out with them. I decide that, Slytherin or no, I can't just leave someone out to dry like that, no matter how bossy the advanced party.

I sigh, and shoo out the bossy prefect girl, actually saying "Shoo, shoo," quietly. Before she can nag some more, I motion for the others to come in. The bossy girl gives me a smug smile, before noticing Patchy. "Hey, all pets are supposed to be-"

_SLAM._ I could have slammed the door with magic, using my wand. But it just wouldn't have been as satisfying.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: I would like to give my thanks to my two Beta Readers, Jordan Cross, and Golden-Quintet. You're the best, and thanks for being constructive in all of your criticism. And by that, seriously. THANK YOU. Y'all are the bestest.<strong>

**For you non-beta readers, I'd like to hear your input as well! What did I get right? Wrong? Let me know, in a PM or a Review! It'd make my day, and help fuel the inspiration/excitement for the next chapter, meaning I'll write faster!**

**Chapter lengths will likely vary. While this one was around 3000 words, most will likely be around 2500 words in length. Will depend on how the tone goes, the heaviness of each chapter story-wise, and other factors. But I want to warn you now, some chapters will be stub-ish in comparison to others.**

**And finally, thank you to the people to submit to me the short bespectacled girl, the moody guy, and the tall girl! (Credit for their creation goes to xXBlueOrchidsXx, A Foolish Fool, and Bellatrix Xavier, respectively.) We'll learn their names soon enough.**

**PS- I decided to upload this to see if there is general excitement for the story. This is an OC submission story. If you would like to submit, PM me, or go to my author page, and go down to the OC Story Search I have down there. Do NOT leave characters in reviews for this story, as they will be ignored, because I will KNOW that you didn't follow the rules I have.**

**PPS- I did NOT upload this because I intend to begin regular updates. I don't. I'm not close to ready for that. I have a few stock-piled chapters, but they took me a long while to write, and there's not that many of them.**


	2. Less Than Stimulating Conversation

**AN: Once more, no consistent schedule yet! I just wanted to put some kind of thing up, so I don't feel like a total slug!**

"Well, it's a beautiful sunny evening, a balmy 80 degrees Fahrenheit, that's approximately 25 in Celsius for you Brits out there," I grin, trying not to get discouraged at the fact that only the small, thin girl is paying me any mind. "And, from both of us here on the Hogwarts Express compartment 32," Patchy flutters down as if on cue, like he can read my mind, and lands gracefully on my shoulder, now thoroughly colored a mellow orange color.

"We thank you for…" _crap. What does a train do? Chug? No, that's stupid!_ After a long pause, with all three of them now looking at me, the guy with contempt, the girls in confusion, I manage to finish lamely, "… riding… with us."

The boy snorts, and I decide I don't quite like his attitude. Instead of dealing with him, though, I sit back down in my seat, directly across from the Slytherin trio, and start twirling my wand again as Patchy gives me his glare that obviously says, 'Love you, Colin,' and flutters up into the luggage compartment to rest in peace.

I smile lamely. "Well, I guess I blew that first impression," I chuckle weakly to myself. _Why did I let these guys in? It's just going to be more people I scare off. And WHY did I talk first, with a joke like that? It wasn't going to funny, no matter how I ended it!_

"No," I give a little bit of a start. I look up, to see the short girl having spoken, the one closest to the door. "Your first impression was pretty okay," she reassures me, sounding like she wasn't quite sure herself. She clears her throat, glancing sideways at her fellow Slytherins. The tall girl in the middle looks a bit encouraging, nodding slightly, while the guy seems to be staring out the window, counting the seconds until he could get out of this compartment. Honestly, I'm right there with him. I'm not exactly great at talking about me…

"I mean," she continues, clearing her throat once again, "you let us into your compartment when nobody else would. That has to count for something." The taller girl nods emphatically, her long black hair doing a strange little dance behind her head. The boy sighs, and shrugs, as if it were a real hassle for him to even do that much.

I try to smile at the compliment, but it feels more like a grimace on my face. "It was nothing. I know how it feels, that's all. It sucks, not having somewhere to go."

The guy glares at me for a second, before looking out the window again. I clear my throat, uncomfortably. "So…" I say, scratching the back of my head. "I'm Colin, nice to meet you all."

"Jackie," the tall girl quietly responds, the ghost of a smile playing across her face. Her silver eyes are kind of twinkling. _Why's she so happy?_ I grumble internally, keeping my own smile pasted across my face. _Did I do something wrong again, and the Slytherins think it's hilarious? Or is she just the out-of-it type, that's always trying to smile at something?_

"I'm Ranae," The shorter one tells me, sounding worried about something. She adjusts her glasses, and starts fiddling with her robes. _She, at least, seems as awkward as me._

I look to the guy expectantly. He ignores me, staring out the window. "He's John," supplies the tall girl. _Jackie. Her name is Jackie. Mom always says it's rude to forget peoples' names._

John fixes her with a glare, and then looks me up and down, sizing me up. He scoffs, and looks out the window again. _Nice to meet you too, jack ass._

"Well," I say, clapping my hands together. It's louder than I intend, and I sheepishly put my hands back at my sides. "It's… uh... It's nice to meet you all." Jackie nods, her faint smile kind of off-putting, like she isn't really processing all that's happening. Ranae manages a squeak of some kind as she pulls a book from her trunk at her feet, hiding behind it. John, obviously, blatantly ignores me.

_This'll be a long ride,_ I think. Patchy, now a patchwork of colors from yellow to red, finally living up to his name, deigns to flutter down from his perch to land on my shoulder, and promptly poops on the nice train seats. _A _really _long ride,_ I amend, pulling my wand out again.

* * *

><p>The rest of the ride passed smoothly enough, until I had to ask them to leave so I could change. I had to calmly explain to the confused Jackie, upset Ranae, and impassive John that I only wanted to change into my robes. I got the feeling that John was a few seconds away from cursing me for a little while, but I managed to change without any more problems.<p>

When the train delivered us to the station, we calmly went our own ways, and ended up with our own Houses as we got into carriages. I got into the same carriage as some familiar-ish Gryffindors in my year, and made my way to the feast. Even another wave of nausea and headaches couldn't turn me off of the coming feast.

* * *

><p>"This sucks," I say to the surrounding fourth year Gryffindors at the opening feast. The new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is <em>still<em> rambling, going on and on about Ministry this, Approved Curriculum that, and banishing any and all happy thoughts of only a few short minutes before, when I was enjoying the entertaining, yet somber, song of the Sorting Hat, and waiting for the feast to commence.

"I know what you mean," replies Salvatore Maxwell di Ravioli… or something like that. His Italian accent is evident to anyone who talks to the guy for ten seconds, and his every word is laced with it, a refreshing change of pace from EVERYONE. BEING. BRITISH. "I could be selling right now," he grumbles, patting the backpack in his lap, no doubt filled with all sorts of crazy and banned items, from Fanged Frisbees to the still-untested Weasely twins' products.

Sal's in good with pretty much everyone, from students, to prefects, to teachers, and I'd even heard he had a reporter that he bought and sold information with. Basically, whatever your need, good old Sally was there to help you. For the right price.

"Not everyone has quite the one-track mind you do, Sal," laughs Robert What'shisface. "I just want to shower up and get to bed."

"You need it, Odair," shoots another Gryffindor in my year. _Benny, maybe? And does that mean I was wrong about Robert's name? Or is that his _last_ name?_ I let my face hit the table, and sigh, ignoring the self-inflicted, stinging pain. _Social hard. Alone easy. Me likey alone._

"Chin up, Colin," laughs (maybe) Robert. "We just need to wait for the old bat to finish rambling, and then we can dig in."

I groan, in time with my stomach, and Robert laughs again. "Shut it, Odair," I mumble, not wanting to risk getting his name wrong and offending him. I may not remember his name well enough, but I _do_ remember he's one of the nicest guys in the Fourth Year. Even if I have no real close friends, Odair's the type of guy to help you in a pinch, and with the charisma that guy has, he's liable to get the whole freaking _Year_ behind you. Not the guy I want to alienate over something stupid.

"You guys don't get it," I moan. "I've been sick _all day._ And I had to deal with a bunch of people. I'm _no good_ with people when I'm sick!"

"You must always be sick," Odair snickers.

"Now you've got it," I mumble, giving a thumbs up without lifting my head. _Well, I'm sick a lot of the time… not _all_ the time. Damn stomach aches, and head-aches, and muscle fatigue, and crap like that. Especially when I use a lot of magic. Hurts like hell then._

"Well," sighs Salvatore, "While I'm stuck with you lot," I can hear the smile in his voice, "anybody want to buy a Fanged Frisbee?"

I lift my head, and look across the table to Sal. He's a little taller than me, maybe 5'9", and slightly more muscular. He's got blue eyes, olive skin, and short-buzzed white hair. Yet another of the guys that girls love. _Of course,_ I muse, _the fact that he can handle other people helps. No girl wants a boy-friend who can hardly talk to someone, let alone her, without mentally shutting down._

"You got any magical aspirin?" I ask sarcastically. He smirks.

"I have _everything,_ my friend." _Course he does._

"How much?" I sigh, rubbing my forehead; I already feel the next head-ache coming on.

"Six galleons," he says, like it's nothing.

"Are you kidding me?" I ask, incredulously. "_One_ galleon's like eight bucks!"

He shrugs. "You wanted magic aspirin."

"Do you have _normal_ aspirin?" I ask desperately. It's not that I don't have the money; it's just that I don't like spending it. My parents don't exactly have galleons, and the only time I earn them is when I work for them. The Three Broomsticks isn't a bad place to work, I guess. It's just… _hard_ work.

"Yeah, I could get you a pack by Charms tomorrow morning," he says, the friendly guy finally sinking under the surface to show the shrewd, but polite, businessman. "_Eight_ galleons for that." He carefully pulls a package out of his ever-present backpack, and places it carefully on the table.

I snort. "I could sneak my own aspirin in, for the equivalent of eight _sickles._ The most I'll pay for something that mundane is maybe _twice_ that. And that's only if I'm _really_ sick." Just then, my nausea returns. I manage to keep down what's left of my lunch, but the gulp is audible, and my headache comes screaming back into my head, worsened by Umbridge's every hammer blow of a word.

"Sixteen sickles? You must not be that sick..." He

_God, it's worse than a freaking banshee! I'd know, we heard one in year two! It's even worse than a baby Mandrake!_ I groan audibly, my head hitting the table again. I pull a galleon from my pocket. "Final offer," I moan pathetically, sliding it halfway across the table to Sal.

I hear the coin slide across the table and off, into his hand. I know I just got hustled out of my money, but I can't muster up enough anger to care. "You're…" I start rubbing my temples again. "You're lucky I _am_ really sick," I groan, my hand scrabbling blindly on the table, my forehead still firmly planted on the same surface, until finally my fingers close around the aspirin. I decide not to use one just yet though. It won't help the nausea, and getting some peace and quiet will help my headache. Besides, it's another week before I get back to work, and that means another two weeks before I get any sort of cash flowing to support my purchases.

"I know," I hear him say, uncharacteristically quiet for him, after a long pause, and I scowl at my feet as the background noise of Umbridge disappears, and I hear the sounds of food being noisily chewed, swallowed, and all around inhaled. I nearly puke again just imagining food in my stomach right now, and stumble off to the common room, done with trying to scrape together responses to questions while fending off my sickness, preferring the nice, quiet, dark to help me rest.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: This chapter, as you may notice, is shorter than the last. Chapter length will vary as needed, though hopefully they'll all be upwards of 1500 words or so.<strong>

**Hopefully, you guys will R and R! No... no, not rest and relax, don't go lounging...! Ah, no, not the hot tub...! Man...**

**Thanks for your (with luck, continued!) readership, and your consideration! I know there are a lot of stories out there, and it means a lot that you're reading mine!**

**Good Luck, and Happy FanFic-ing!**

**Monkey Typewriter**

**EDIT: Added little line-breaks for the fast-forwards, to try and avoid confusion. I should have had them to begin with, but it didn't occur to me for some reason. Unprofessional of me, and I apologize. I didn't realize that the asterisks I used to start with disappeared in the Doc here.**


	3. Bad Dreams, Worse Temper

The stairs were pretty hard, and now my head is throbbing in time with my heartbeat. I'm in front of the Fat Lady, and remember seconds before she asks for it that I don't remember the password. _Even if I did_, I realize, _it wouldn't matter; there's a new password for the year, which I don't know. Way to start the year, genius._

"Well?" She prompts impatiently. "Password? Or are you just going to stand there?"

"Uh…" _Dear Lord, the paintings are almost as bad as the people!_ "Uh… no?"

"No _what_? No password? No, you're not just standing here?"

"Uh, the second one…?"

"Are you asking me, young man, or telling me?"

"I'm, uh… telling…?" I shake my head, ignoring the throbbing, and realizing that she'll just keep harassing me if I don't end this now. "I'm… I'm telling you, ma'am."

"Alrighty then," she answers cheerfully, her frustration immediately gone. (I guess oil paintings are a bit more _fluid_ with how they think? Eh?) "We'll just have to wait until the end of the feast, for the rest of the House to get up here!" she chirps.

"Fantastic," I mutter, sitting against the wall, curling up my knees, and laying my arms on them for use as a pillow. _I swear,_ I think to myself as I drift off to sleep, _if they leave me sitting out here, I'll hex them into next week._

And rather than ask myself exactly who I meant by 'they,' I simply drift off to sleep, sitting in a lonely hall of a castle, my only company a semi-living painting. Mom would be so proud.

* * *

><p><em>What is this place? All those little silver machines, puffing smoke everywhere…<em>very_annoying. And all those portraits… ugh. It's like always being watched. And who… Professor Snape? I don't want to dream about that jerk!_

Against my wishes, I step towards Snape, right before the desk he's sitting at. He looks up to see me, and greets me in a voice that I presume to be his friendliest withering voice.

_"What is it, Amycus?"_ he asks me, his voice strangely… hollow. _Amy-what? Is he blind? He knows me. He HATES me, but he-_

_"It's that Longbottom bloke,"_I complain in a voice that certainly isn't mine, which sounds similarly hollow. I sound… British. _VERY_ British. _DEAR GOD NO!_

_"He keeps resisting me,"_'I' continue, _"no matter how much I get the students to 'practice' on him. I was wondering, maybe we could use a curse a bit more…_permanent_than the Cruciatus?"_

Snape's features immediately go cold. Well, colder. _"As long as I'm headmaster, Carrow,"_ He says icily, standing up, a good head taller than me. _"No students will come to permanent harm in Hogwarts. Am I understood?"_

I feel a smile come to my face, which I'm beginning to suspect _isn't_ my face, according to the thick stubbly itch on it. I scratch it nonchalantly. _"What I think you mean, Snape, is that as long as you're the Dark Lord's favorite play thing. 'Can't 'magine why, if you're too afraid to use the old Avada!"_

I let out a deep, obnoxious laugh, and my eyes close a minute as the hilarity sweeps over me, my fist pounding a table, knocking over one of the silver machines. I hear a mere whisper, _"Crucio,"_ and immediately, my body is on fire, no, I'm freezing, dissolving, Burning, CUTTING, RENDING TEARING RIPPINGPEELINGDROWNINGDYINGIMDYINGI—

* * *

><p>I wake up, shivering, whimpering at the mere memory of the pain. I can't stop shaking, wrapping my arms around myself, and rocking back and forth. <em>It felt so… real.<em> I shiver again, the pain fading, but the familiar nausea returning. I find myself on my hands and knees, retching up nothing but bile onto the floor. _Worse… than before._

"Really now," tuts the Fat Lady from her frame. "Who do you think is the one to clean that up? Argus will just stand there, mopping and complaining to me for hours!"

I growl as I stand, pulling out my wand. I feel a sudden heat as my hand closes around it, banishing the nausea and pain of before. _"Scourgify."_ I curse as the small puddle of up-chuck grows in size. A freaking Engorgement Charm. Really? _I HATE Charms, sometimes!_

I smack my wand against my leg a few times, and curse as my leg locks itself up. I feel a small fire light itself in the back of my mind as my frustration grows, and I curse again for good measure. I tap it against my leg again, softer, and I feel the appendage relax, freed from the spell. I point my wand at the puddle again, and mutter the incantation once more, the puddle this time disappearing in a flash of soap bubbles, and with a scent of lemon. I turn to the Fat Lady. "There," I growl, "Now, _Shut. Up._"

"I'm glad you don't know the password," she tells me with a scowl. "Because I wouldn't let you in even _if_ you had it."

"Liar," I grumble, settling back on the floor, and shoving my wand back into the fold of my robe, groaning as the nausea returns, along with a sudden chill in my bones. The dream still weighs heavily on my mind, slowly smothering the fire in my head.

I try to think it over. _That Amycus guy… or me… or whoever, said something about the Dark Lord. That Voldy-whoever. _I shudder, not remembering the name, but remembering a brief lecture from Professor Binns about the First Wizarding War that distracted me from transfiguring my quill into a mouse and back. Countless deaths, starting with the Mudbloods and Muggles of the world… thousands killed by a single man, and the network of fear, betrayal, and servitude he inspired. _Why am I dreaming about that guy?_

_Alright, let's consider this a second. Snape said… he was Headmaster. So that means Dumbledore would have retired. Which he'd never do. It was just a stupid dream after all. _I shake my head, trying to clear the thoughts from my head, satisfied in the reasoning, even if a pit of worry kept worming around in my stomach.

"So why…" I ask nobody, my back settling against the cool stone wall, "did I dream that I was someone else? That… that Amycus Carrow guy?" I shake my head, and practically jump out of my skin when I hear a girlish laugh off to the left, from the hallway that goes past the Owlery. I turn, to see two black Hogwarts robes stepping towards me, each emblazoned with a green snake on the chest, one robe a little shorter than me with the face of a pretty girl sticking out of the top, a hand held to her face to stifle a chuckle.

The other had a jerk sticking out of it. I scowl, but don't bother getting to my feet. It wouldn't be worth the stomach-flipping, head-buzzing sensation that I'm sure I'd get right now, judging by the weakness in my limbs. My wand is buzzing in the pocket-like fold in my robe, and I reach a hand in, holding it. Warmth flows up into my hand from it once again, and I feel a little less queasy. I have enough strength to deepen my scowl, too, as the imaginary fire in my head begins to rekindle.

The girl, I don't remember her name... Roxy, Riley? The girl that was on the platform with him. Rose? _Yeah,_ I think to myself, _that sounds right._ She stops laughing when she sees me. She notices my scowl aimed at the scumbag she's holding hands with, and returns it in force, glaring at me for all she's worth. Jordan looks down at their clasped hands, like maybe her grip had tightened, and then up at me. I notice the barest hint of a smile on his face, before it disappears beneath the veneer of a cold, calculating mask as he recognizes me.

Rose keeps stopping, tugging on his hand trying to turn Cross around. Cross ignores this, and continues on his way towards me. My hand tightens on my wand, and I feel the stream of warmth turn into heat, almost uncomfortable.

I pull it out, and aim it vaguely in their direction. He clearly sees it, and doesn't react. He continues walking, without breaking stride. He turns away from me at the stairwell, walking his girlfriend down the stairs. Rose keeps turning to look at me suspiciously, like she expects me to make the first move, until their heads disappear on the other side of the stairs.

_He didn't even respond to me…_ I think to myself. I squeeze the wand ever tighter, and climb to my feet, the threat of sickness disappearing. I can practically feel it, the warmth flowing from my hand to my head. The fire is blazing now, engulfing everything else.

I stride to the top of the stairway, a growl escaping my lips when I notice them, already near the bottom of the stairs. _He just kept walking, like I'm not even a THREAT. Like I could never hurt him, like I'm not good enough!_

I begin shaking with rage. I'm aware of a distinct twitching in my face. "Cross!"_ I call down to him. He WILL acknowledge me. If he doesn't, I'm going to…_ I leave the thought open-ended, not entirely comfortable with the answer.

He hits the bottom of the landing, and turns to begin walking down the next set of stairs. I swear I can make out a grin on his face._ The smug… That piece of…_

_"CROSS!"_ I scream, swinging my wand wildly in his direction. No spell was uttered, but a wave of pure force launches from my wand, distorting the air slightly, crackling like a whip in his direction, and-

It bounces of a bright blue tinge surrounding Cross and his girl, forcing him and the girl who he has his arm around to stumble forward. He turns to stare at me, fixing me with his intense gray eyes, seeming almost inquisitive. I glare down at him, no doubt in my mind as to the anger on my face. He mutters something quietly, and after a frown appears on Rose's face, she turns and walks away, continuing down the stairs.

He walks forward, placing his right foot on the lowermost stair. His cloak billows a little in a burst of wind as he draws his wand. If I weren't so pissed off, I might be impressed by the theatrics. "You have my attention," he says in a quiet, cold voice that carries all the way up the long flight, into my ears.

"I don't _WANT_ your attention!" I spit. "_Stupefy!_" My stunning spell is reflected off of a bubble of blue force, though this time, he had to at least raise his wand to cast the spell. "What I _WANT!_ _IMPEDIMENTIA!_ Is to WIPE that _SMUG LOOK OFF OF YOUR FACE!_" I growl, whipping my wand and calling out all of the incantations I could recall at the moment. "I _WANT _to put you in the _INFIRMARY!_"

I feel something wrong off to my left, a mere impression, a tickling on the back of my neck, and my head whips around for a moment. My eyes catch the barest flicker of movement, before my wand jerks upwards, almost of its own accord, and I'm forced to stumble backwards as a freezing charm splatters against the hastily cast shield charm.

"You won't get that," he assures me, gliding up the stairs easily. "But as I said," he continues in his calm voice, as more of my spells are reflected away, "you have my full attention. The least you can do is give me yours."

I seethe as he continues, unhindered. My eyes must be wild in my head, darting about, looking for some clue as to what to do. _Stick with what you know,_ I reason, before Conjuring an eagle to attack him.

He scoffs, raising his wand and sending an over-sized, conjured rattlesnake into the air to meet it. They tumble to the floor before I forget them, focusing on my fight, rather than theirs.

I tap the stairs, and manage to Transfigure all of them into a steep ramp of ice. Cross begins sliding backwards before he taps it with his own wand, and they're suddenly stairs again. He only stumbles backwards a moment before regaining his footing, but already, I'm Conjuring a literal kitchen sink that soars towards him. Having a sense of humor, I guess, he summons a bath-tub to catch it, before making both disappear with a wave of his wand, Vanishing them.

Transfiguration's always been my best subject. Hell, I can even Conjure without saying an incantation, and I'm only a Fourth Year! But Cross is matching me step for step without breaking stride, and is already half-way up the staircase, even at his leisurely pace.

_Time to change the game,_ I think to myself. _"Wingardium Leviosa!"_ A swish and flick later, Cross is floating in the air, and I smirk as I make him hover above the next set of stairs over, at least a fifteen foot drop. It'd hurt, if nothing else, give a few broken bones at the worst. Charms may be my worst subject, but even _I_ can manage the simple ones like this.

I release the spell, but my smirk changes to a scowl as Cross twists in mid-air, leaning back, and shouting _"Wingardium Leviosa"_ himself, pointing his wand at his robes, hanging in the cradle of his now floating loose clothes, and hovering back over to the stair-case that served as our battle ground. He drops easily to the ground, the calm look on his face suddenly replaced by one of concentration.

_I _HAD_ HIM!_ I internally rage, throwing spell after spell at Cross. I begin resorting to jinxes and hexes. I don't know them too well, but the ones I do know I'm pretty good at. The Bat-Bogey Hex, the Backfire Jinx, the Conjunctivitis Hex, the Jelly-Legs Jinx, and a few others. All of which splattered across his shield again. And again. And _AGAIN._

I begin throwing out more spells, harder spells, spells I don't even remember, all of which seem severely painful in nature. I'm not even bothering to call out spell names anymore. Something's changed. Saying the incantation is more of a hindrance now, wasting precious time thinking about the last spell when I could be thinking of the next. I'm simply picturing the effects, what I want to happen to Cross, and my wand is moving almost on its own, as if leading my hand, rather than the other way around, and all the while, the effects are bouncing off of his shield.

A bolt of flame scorches the wall, a deep gash in the stair, a patch of ice on the ceiling, all reflected off of Cross's shield charm. And all the time, my spells are growing in power. Cross doesn't flinch, continuing on with not a single slip-up. Though, I do take pride in the concentrated look I've forced onto his face.

A wave of force. A bolt of lightning. A flock of eagles. An entire Conjured _car._ All of which I throw at Cross with the flick of a wrist and total concentration, Conjuring, again, with little effort.

I grimace as he gets closer and closer. Twenty feet away… fifteen… ten, five, and-

He tripped! No, no he didn't trip, he stepped on one of the trick-stairs! I sneer as I pull my wand back, prepared to sling a pure bolt of force at him, launching him backwards, maybe breaking his leg, if it stays stuck fast like that. _I don't care, _I assure myself as I roar, the fire in my head doing the same, crying out for pain, needing it, _feeding _on it, on mine, my anger, my hatred, and growing, building them up, and ready to feast on _his_.

The seconds stretch into minutes as Cross slowly lifts his head, a look of shock on his face. He reaches for his dropped wand, right next to him, but he won't be fast enough. I _know_ that he won't be fast enough, and I'm delighted. A predatory instinct has entered my mind, and I know just how slow he'll be.

My spell is practically already cast, and his wand is hardly off the floor. And then, it's _not._ It's in his hands, like it leapt into them, and it's pulling his hand up, putting it in position, for-

_"Protego!"_ he shouts, and my spell rebounds off of the protective shell. My eyes widen as the energy, so strong it's causing visible ripples in the air, flies into my body full-force, sending me back into the wall behind me. My head hits the wall, hard, and I'm hardly conscious when I hit the floor.

"Well," huffs Cross, his voice calm again, as he kicks my wand away, still clutched in my hand with a strength the rest of my body lacks. "You wanted to send me to the infirmary. It looks like at least one of us is heading there."

As my eleven inch weapon clatters to the ground away from me, I feel my strength leave, replaced by a wave of coldness, and the world swims in and out of focus, my body wracked by pain, sickness, and a now-fading anger as I realize I'd lost again to Cross. I shiver, in rage and cold, trying not to whimper from the different sensations trying to drive the awareness from my body.

"Yes," drawls a superior, disinterested voice as I finally lose my grip on consciousness. "And it seems," Professor Snape continues, "That you're both going to detention."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Well, I got some action! Awesome, in my opinion! Feels good, even if my hero lost wha appears to be both the battle and the war.<strong>

**More pressing, however, any questions, comments, or ideas you have, let me know, and I'll do my best to answer in a timely manner! Either PM or Review, and I'll see it pretty soon!**

**Even MORE important, I still don't have a real 'schedule,' so I'm planning on sitting on the chapters I still have un-posted, and only putting one up when the next is finished, or if I feel like I haven't posted in a while.**

**Good Luck, and Happy FanFic-ing! **

**Monkey Typewriter**


	4. Medicinal Liquid Feet

_My wand. I see it floating towards me, the familiar deep brown hunk of wood giving me a small amount of comfort. Just seeing it calmed my nerves a little. So long in total darkness makes it a welcome sight._

_A light is shining from the top, as if someone had cast Lumos with it, cutting through the darkness before it. I see thick branches in the trees above, a nearly unbroken canopy of leaves, faintly illuminated by the wand so far below it. On the ground, the thick carpet of moss, dead, rotting leaves, and the odd twig rustle as whatever holds the wand moves towards me. It looks like the type of things you'd see in the forbidden forest, but I don't recognize this part of it…_

_And then the light shifts, and I see the previously invisible hand holding the wand , emerging from the deep shadows surrounding it. I recognize the scars, made from countless claw, bite, and scratch marks. It's my hand. And then my face appears from its shroud of darkness, glaring at me. This is really creepy. Is this an out of body experience or something?_

_The face that stares at me, MY face, I need to remind myself, isn't entirely sane. It's too difficult to believe that the face I see in the mirror when I'm brushing my teeth could ever look so... Mad. That's the right word for it. The face is mad… angry, and filled with a special kind of insanity._

_The eyes are wide, wild… and yellow, where everything I know about myself tells me they should be as brown as the stringy, greasy hair on the strange vision of me's head. The unkempt hair is rather long, as if I'd been out in the woods for a while. The eyes keep drawing my attention, though. They look like something that belongs on an animal, and I know my animals. They're the kind of eyes that a predator bears, and an especially deadly one at that._

_The mad face that belongs to the insane 'me' is covered in dirt, the few freckles I have hidden by a healthy coating of the stuff. The other me is thin, emaciated, really, and I can see the hunger etched into my face in lines, deep and brutal, in a way that makes me wonder if the other me is hungry for something other than food. I try to see if there's any sign that he… I, had hurt anyone. I see a dark, thick liquid dripping from my hand, and I almost investigate. But the eyes continue to draw my attention, even as the wind rustles, the shadows dance in the wandlight, and the other me licks his lips in anticipation of something._

_The yellow eyes are shaking in place, and flitting about the surroundings, searching for something. The strange image of me opens its mouth, and roars an evil laugh. The many teeth are sharp and jagged, but still human sized. The strange vision of me lunges at ME-me, the familiar eleven inch oaken wand brimming with power as it's aimed in my direction, ejecting a green streamer of energy, angrily, wildly hurtling towards me-_

* * *

><p>I wake up with a jolt, and glance about wildly before I grunt, falling back into the soft hospital bed, groaning as a deep, bone-tired soreness invades my body, accompanied by the norm of nausea. "This suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks." I sing to myself, trying not to fall back asleep. Still, it's more comfortable than the hallway outside Gryffindor Tower.<p>

"Language, Mr. Napier," reprimands Madame Pomfrey as she appears from behind a curtain, holding a light blue potion, with a blue mist floating into the air behind it, leaving a bright trail. I can smell it from where I am, unconsciously knowing it'll taste the same as it smells… like cough medicine on steroids, absolutely disgusting. "I'll not have you spoiling my Monday Morning with foul language," she scolds.

I gag as she brings it closer, on a combination of the scent of the mist wafting towards me, and the word 'Monday,' as Madame Pomfrey rolls her eyes. "You couldn't possibly know how this tastes," she complains.

"Oh, I know," I assure her, hesitantly taking the vial from her hand. "I have a sixth sense when it comes to all things 'unpleasant.'" The smell from here is like how a scream right in your ear is, both unpleasant, and harmful to the sense. I already feel nose-hairs sizzling.

Madame Pomfrey laughs for a moment, probably at the expression on my face, before I toss back the liquid. She manages not to laugh at the FAR worse expression my face is now home to, somehow. She begins talking over my coughing, hacking, and gagging, asking, "If that's true, why do you always find yourself in my infirmary?"

I manage to spit a globule of blue saliva on the floor, shuddering at the taste. "It's like," I describe out loud, shuddering again, "Somebody took liquid feet, and mixed it with ground up maggots, and added cough syrup for that extra pinch of barf-itude."

Madame Pomfrey simply tuts at me, forgoing her usual 'if it's good for you, it doesn't need to taste good' spiel, Vanishes the disgusting spit, and informs me that the Headmaster has given me the day off, due to my injuries, even though I will still be punished for my misdeeds.

"I should get into fights more often, if they get me out of Mondays," I mumble with a wry smile on my face. Madame Pomfrey just shakes her head, and walks off to find someone else to poison. As foul as it tastes, I already start feeling better. The soreness is disappearing, the nausea lessening, if not quite dissipating entirely, and a headache I didn't even realize I had is now gone. Madame Pomfrey really is the best at what she does. Too bad she can't make health taste good.

I stand up, out of my hospital bed, shake my vision clear after a short bout of blindness due to a head rush, and begin on my way, before something freezes me in place. Not the 'someone just jinxed me' kind of freezing either, but the sense of foreboding and unexplainable weirdness that comes from the arrival, or delayed noticing of, a hated individual, one that can't be beaten no matter what you do.

"Napier," Snape calls out from behind me, and I turn to see him standing over Cross, who is sleeping with his eyes glued shut. "Come here, I'd like you to see your handiwork." I can't hear any difference from his usual Gryffindoooooooooooors voice, but I can practically feel the extra malice coming from him. I shudder, and turn from the entrance going in the opposite direction everything in me is telling me I should. Leaving the entrance behind to talk to Snape. Only good things can happen, only good things.

As I get closer, I see that Cross's wand hand looks bandaged, and his wand is sitting on the table beside him, a dark brown wooden focus for his magic, with lazy, spiraling and winding lines carved into the handle. Something feels weird about it. When I look at it, I feel like it has its own air of power, like it's… dark. Darker than a wand has any right to be.

I shift in place, not really comfortable staring at it, and the image of it seemingly moving on its own during my fight with Cross pops into my head. Something is definitely… wrong with it. Sure, it's possible for someone to do magic without a wand… Heck, most kids have, but once you learn to rely on a wand… perhaps it's more like a crutch, than anything else, but very few people retain the ability to do any kind of magic without a wand.

I find it hard to believe that Cross…I shake my head slightly in disgust. No, no I don't find it hard to believe that Mr. Perfect can do magic without a wand. Not in the slightest.

But… It's hard to hate a guy when he's unconscious. Especially if you're the one who made him unconscious. Right now, I just feel bad, even though I supposedly was the only one hit in our fight. "How did he get hurt?" I ask Snape, curious now, as well as feeling pretty guilty.

"One of your hexes or jinxes got by his shields, I would assume," Snape states matter of factly.

Wrong, I think. I know for a fact that nothing hit him. If it had, I might've even won.

"You fought like a man possessed," Snape continues, sounding very much like he was doing the opposite of complimenting me. "Throwing spells that I am sure your Defense Against the Dark Arts Teachers never taught, and Transfiguring and Conjuring far above your year's level."

For a moment, I swell with pride, before I remember that I'm dealing with Snape, and immediately begin waiting for the other shoe to drop. He simply stands in place, looking down at Cross with a curious expression on his face. And when I say curious, I mean actually curious, not British-speak for weird. He was just as confused as me. Well, probably a little less confused than me. But still, very much confused.

I follow suit, and try to find whatever he's looking for, gazing so intently at Cross. Cross doesn't look any different to me. Same everything, really, except for that bandage around his wand arm. And am I crazy, or is the bandage getting darker…?

"Napier," Snape says sharply, breaking me out of my staring contest with the now-apparently-pure-white cloth. "I will see you tonight at eight o' clock, am I understood?" I nod dumbly, glancing back to Cross. His expression seems darker now, less 'peaceful sleep,' and more 'horrifying nightmare, please wake me up.'

So, naturally, I agree with Professor Snape, leave awkwardly, and head back to Gryffindor Tower.

* * *

><p>"So," Salvatore asks from the bed beside mine, already wide awake, but returning to get more of his 'stock' from underneath his bed. He pulls out a large cardboard box, and tosses me a packet of aspirin from inside. I almost grab it out of the air, but it bounces off my fingertips and lands on the floor. I sigh, stooping over to pick them up, as Sal begins filling the backpack he only bothers with on the weekends with contraband and sweets, and little notes of paper I can only assume are part of his whole 'information trade' thing.<p>

"So?" I ask, retracting my hand as Patchy, a beautiful sky blue with patches of gold, yellow, and red pasted across his feathers, grabs the little box of relief from the floor in a talon, perches on top of the curtain-rod of my bed, balanced on the other talon, and begins staring down at me, as if daring me to come and try him. I scowl at him, and reach under my bed to pull out my black dragon skin gloves.

"So, how was your fight with Cross?" He asks, and immediately, I search around the room to make sure that nobody hears me. I shake my head, and pull the gloves on, rolling up my sleeves, and standing on the bed, reaching after the bird as he flutters to the other side of the room, perched precariously on the door frame.

"Not too bad," I grunt, jumping after Patchy, and sprinting after the damn bird as soon as my feet touch the floor to catch up with him. I jump when I reach the other side, snagging his foot with an ever-so slight grip, and jerking him down, forcing him to drop the aspirins which I then pick up, and stuff into my pocket. "I think I won," I tell him, and I hear him chuckle.

"Nobody beats Cross, my friend," He chuckles, pulling a cigarette from his pocket. I pull out my wand, with a scowl on my face, and Vanish it from across the room.

"Yeah, well nobody wants the bed-room to smell like cigarettes. Take it outside, or do it out the window."

"Fine," He mutters, no doubt pissed at me. This isn't the first time I've pulled this type of thing, and I know Salvatore hates it, but if it keeps me from smelling smoke whenever I wake up in the morning, I don't really care. "But I heard that Cross knocked you out with your own spell."

"Yeah, well," I respond, flustered and frustrated, in a voice that doesn't exactly invite further conversation. "Take a look at who's walking around, and who's still in the infirmary." I flop onto my bed, annoyed, and glare at the plain ceiling until I hear him walk away, and the door shut. I sigh in relief, and roll into a sitting position. "I guess I should expect the information broker to be nosy," I tell Patchy, "but man, will he just let me have my win?"

Patchy eyes me sagely before raising his head in a thoughtful manner, and squawking. "We're in a magic school," I joke, "Would a simple 'I know Colin, he's the worst' be so hard?" He crows again, and I chuckle at the face he's giving me. "Yeah, well, I can dream, can't I?"

Just as Patchy seems ready to shriek in argument, the door swings open, and a walking contradiction walks in. She's a little bit taller than me, maybe 5'9", or a little under 1.75 meters, for the 'Bri'ish ou' theah.' She carries herself with the confidence of a predator, like she knows what she wants, and whatever gets in her way can screw off. She's not stick thin, like some of the girls around school, and wouldn't really be considered any sort of thin, though she couldn't really be classified as fat, either.

There's a reason I don't talk to people. I don't even know what to think about them, much less how to converse with them.

She's tan-looking, like she spends her summers somewhere fairly exotic, and her red hair falls down her back like a semi-sparkling waterfall of… red hair. And I'm not just being poetic, it's actually sparkling. Some sort of spell, or glitter, I suppose. It's kind of distracting, until I see the… more dangerous accessory.

She's wearing the black robes that all students wear, but the yellow lining and badger on her chest mark her as a Hufflepuff, and she's currently lightly petting the snake draped over her shoulder and around the neck, as its rattle shakes. It's a diamondback rattlesnake, known to be very deadly and very… well, deadly.

"Shut it, Taleen," She's muttering, "I know you like this, you freak. If you were a freaking cat, that rattling would be purring, and you know it." The snake, Taleen, hisses in response, baring its fangs. I stand up and take a step back involuntarily, immediately wary of something that can kill me in two-plus hours in a slow, agonizing way with one bite.

Patchy leaps up to the curtains around my bed, recognizing that this Taleen is deadly. Jerk. Not like I can hide on the bed-post. "Uh, hello?" I say hesitantly, trying to keep calm and quiet, not wanting to alarm the snake and cause it to bite the Hufflepuff girl.

She looks my way, and waves lazily. "Hey. What's up?" she asks nonchalantly, ignoring the snake coiling around her neck like it wasn't about to kill her. Venomous snakes don't constrict, so it won't choke her. They bite, hence the venom... But his mouth is still pretty damn close to her jugular, it could maybe just bite and rip, and she'd be dead in minutes. I shake my head at the less than pleasant thought.

"Uh…" I point at my neck, trying not to stress the point too much, to the point where the deadly, deadly reptile would pick up on my panic. "Deadly snake?" I whisper.

"Oh," she sighs, and pulls the snake off easily, handling it like someone would a harmless rabbit. Well, not harmless, they get pretty vicious. But a not deadly rabbit. "This is Taleen. She isn't deadly."

"That," I say, pointing at the wriggling rattlesnake, which the girl finally sets on the floor, allowing it to slither around the room. I jump up onto my bed, drawing a laugh from the girl. "is a Diamondback Rattlesnake," I tell her, "Probably the tenth deadliest venomous snake in the world. And when I say 'tenth,' I mean it might as well be number one because it's DEADLY AS HELL."

She chuckles again. "Nah, I just replaced her venom with a paralytic. She can hunt and everything, but she knows not to hurt people, and if she ever does try, it's only strong enough to immobilize a person for maybe five minutes."

I shake my head. "Well," I mutter, climbing off the bed, trying to gather my shattered pride from the floor, "you could have led with that."

"Oh, I could've." She assures me. "It just wouldn't be as fun."

People. This is what I get for interacting with people. "Alright, well… what are you doing in the guys' room? And… Gryffindor Tower?" I ask, remembering that she's a Hufflepuff, after spying a flash of yellow on her robe's chest.

"I needed something, and I heard a Gryffindor was the guy to talk to. Are you him?" I shake my head, and she looks a little disappointed, and bored. Am I boring? I hope not.

"No, you're looking for Sal. He has just about everything you could want." I pause for a second, and smirk, deciding to try for a joke. "And he's not paying me to say that stuff."

She shrugs, decidedly not laughing. Well, I guess there's a reason I'm not a comedian.

"Where is he?" she asks. "What does he look like?"

"Tall, Italian," I describe vaguely, "tan skin, probably has a backpack of… 'merchandise.' White hair, crew-cut…"

"Wait, white hair? I thought only that one prick had white hair… what's his name, Jordan?"

I clutch my hands to my heart. I think I'm in love, I joke to myself inwardly. "Thank you, for saying that," I say without explaining, "But no, good old Sally has white hair too."

"Uh… whatever," she says, not understanding my little thank you, I suppose. "Thanks, I guess." She scoops up her snake, which begins twisting around her arm, tail rattling in what I'd guess is annoyance, and she begins to walk out of the room. I wave goodbye, and whistle for Patchy to come down. He gives me the evil eye as he flutters onto my waiting, black-gloved left arm, leaving me confused.

"What, did I do something wrong? She… she…" I slap the unoccupied hand to my face. "I didn't ask her name once, did I?" Patchy flies back up to the curtains, and settles himself on a corner, looking from me to the doorway.

"Well," I defend myself, "It's not like she asked me MY name!" Patchy keeps glancing at the doorway, but faster and faster, more insistently.

"Fine, fine," I mutter. "Leave me alone again to talk to the snake girl." When I reach the door, I hear him flutter indignantly onto my shoulder, and I grin, feeling a little bit less annoyed with the bird. I don't rush down the stairs, instead trying to think of how and if I knew the girl.

Well, she looks sort of familiar… Maybe I have a class with her? The only classes I have with any Hufflepuffs are Herbology and my Electives… But she doesn't seem familiar from my electives, or Herbology, really… Then again, Professor Sprout keeps me by the front of the room, so I can't very well see everyone behind me. But she must be in Herbology, and she's probably in at least one of my Electives, and I just haven't been paying enough attention.

I'm at the bottom of the stairs before I know it, and look around the common room. I spy the red-haired, tanned girl walking away from Sal, stuffing what looks like a few galleons into her pocket. Now THAT'S interesting, I muse, stopped in my tracks with surprise. Never seen Sal actually PAY for anything before. He always seems to have a favor with whoever he needs something from. Heck, he's in good with everyone.

And, now that I've stopped and marveled at Sal, I turn my gaze back to where the girl was. I sigh, shaking my head; she's gone, and Hogwarts is a big place. I'm unlikely to find her if I just blunder about the castle looking. I turn my head to look down at a very frustrated Patchy. "Cool it, buddy," I mutter, meandering back up the stairs to the Fourth Year room. "It's not like I meant it, and it certainly isn't your job to help me be 'social.'"

His ruffling feathers and looking away from me respond clearly, 'well someone has to do it.'

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Wow, Fourth chapter, like 10,000 words of actual story, and it's STILL just the second day back! It isn't even a SCHOOL day, just Sunday! I promise, the pace WILL pick up once I have all the starting bases down, maybe in chapter 6? I don't know, but Yeah. Hopefully.<strong>

**Also, I'm not sure if I made this clear enough last time I posted a chapter here... I won't let two weeks go by without updating something. Now, I didn't make this perfectly clear, but that includes all of my stories, because I suck. Sorry. My excuse for such a long time this instance is my updating of another story, Bloodstone. Yep, not advertising or anything...**

**Also, I know that it wasn't a weekend, the day everybody got back to Hogwarts. I just made it such for the sake of the story. You'll probably notice small changes to time frames on things, when things happen, or the omission of smaller events that have no bearing on the story, as this story will not follow Harry. Also, in this Fic, I'm entirely omitting the Creevys, probably. I don't know. Having two 'Colin's in the same House, in the same Year, might be confusing, though it might be fun to introduce him later…**

**Oh, and by the way, the girl we just met was submitted by Ms. Kiwisaurus. She's a writer too, and she has some Harry Potter stuff, feel free to check her out! I'm currently serving as a beta for a planned project of hers, though she's suspended writing it in favor of other stories she's working on. God, I know how that feels…**

**Well, as always, you know what to do!**  
><strong>Please, if you would, Rate and Review!<strong>

**That little rhyme just popped into my head. I don't quite have the audacity to call it a poem. But do what it says, it RHYMES!**

**MINOR EDIT: I thought the italics for the dream section had transferred over, but was mistaken. I've made them italicized now.**


End file.
